Stars
by Maruba
Summary: Alone in the night, Henry finally gets the peace and silence required to contemplate his new existence. I guess you could call this a Henry character study?


a/n Been replaying through FE: A in preparation for Fates and it's rekindled my love of Henry and Gaius. They're both wonderful characters and I kind of they had a support because that would be really entertaining. I also want Lon'qu and Gaius to have a support outside Summer Scramble because that just needs to happen. So anyhow I wrote this little Henry thing that was never going to have a plot really it's just musing.

Disclaimer: I am writing fanfiction, so I'm probably not the owner of Fire Emblem, aight?

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What were stars made out of? Little specks of all the dusty pieces of soul he'd ripped out of the bodies of his enemies since he was able to hold a tome? If not that then perhaps instead it was long forgotten memories. Little excursions at the academy, his childhood adventure of many rooms and many doors, but not a single window. No moonlight through which to give people that eery midnight glow he'd sense fallen in love with.

The boy laughed. Look at him, musing over something as insignificant as the sparkling lights in the sky above him. They were inconsequential to his existence. If he wanted to he could go through the rest of his life without them ever crossing his mind and not once truly suffer from this reality. He was bred and born to be on the battle field, nothing but a killing machine filled with rage and vengeance. If it had been up to the people who trained him, they would have taken out every part of his brain that didn't kill things and take orders.

He bent down and looked at his reflection in the clear water. What was with him tonight? Was he usually this contemplative and only just now noticing it? Did other people do this? Did Gaius ponder the infinities of the universe in between trips to the forest to harvest honey from angry bees? Did Frederick ever think about little specks of dust beneath his feet when he wasn't thinking about Chrom? He knew Libra thought about things like this, but he wasn't entirely interested in talking to the religious man. He made the young dark mage uncomfortable.

He pulled at a collection of strands of white hair and frowned a little. Why didn't he look like the other Plegians? Of course, the paleness of his skin was rather fitting for one of their mages. While Plegia was a hot, unforgiving desert nation, mages were raised in hot, dark buildings with no windows so they never saw sunlight except for the few hours they were given supervised practice outside. Perhaps there was some odd gene that gave him the white hair? There were of course Plegians with lighter hair, Gangrel for one example. However, all the mages he studied with had dark hair and dark eyes, and most of the soldiers he'd seen had the very same.

He studied his frown, and then smiled again. It didn't reach his eyes. Had it ever reached his eyes? Was there a time when his mouth would curve and the brightness would reach his eyes, and they would sparkle. Lissa's eyes did that, Ricken's too. Was he so broken that whatever line made that happen no longer functioned or was he just not...happy? Did not being happy making him bad? He was happy around crowns and animals and dead bodies. Or at least he thought he was. Was he broken, like all the teachers all said they would make him?

Were stars broken? Were they happy? Did they even have emotions? If they did, then it was selfish of them to be unhappy, the boy thought. They had nothing to care about, nothing to be responsible for. He had the power of the world at his fingertips and could use it to destroy everyone and everything and yet since he joined The Shepherds he found for the first time he didn't want to. All these emotions and thoughts confused him. He was so used to feeling dead inside, and wanting to be that way on the outside. Did he still want that? Or did he not? Why were there so many choices? This wasn't fair. Other people didn't seem to think this way.

He turned his back to the water and looked up at the sky again, dropping his fake smile again. It felt so wrong for it to not be on his face, and yet liberating. Like taking off a mask that had been on so long it was a second layer of skin. He let the moon reflect off his eyes, the brightness almost hurting his eyes, which had always been weak to light. He took a deep breath and felt the chill of the night air run into his body, and felt a surge of familiarity. While Plegia was filled with hot deserts, the nights were bitter and cold, though never snowing, like it was in Regna Ferox. He smiled at the comfort of the chill, a real smile. A smile he had not given in years, his eyes shining with the glowing orb above him.

Perhaps stars weren't selfish if they weren't happy. Without unhappiness or even numbness, whatever he'd had before this, happiness would not be worthwhile. He would only feel this for a moment, but the moment was splendid. It was a sense of freedom, something he had no memory of ever experiencing. Every day of his life someone was ordering him around, orders he continued to believe would mean death if not followed, though he wasn't reliable with training all the time. But now, in this moment of silence and peace, he managed to find a place within himself where he was himself and he could expand towards the sky with dark wings and become his own brilliant glittering dot with no responsibilities and no nightmares and no worries.

He opened his arms and closed his eyes, falling back. He felt the water surge around him, a liquid coldness surrounding him. He swam up to the top and floated on his back, rubbing his eyes and opening them to look up into the sky.

For once, Henry was a star.

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Well, what do you think? This is my first published Fire Emblem fic so I would enjoy to know what your guys' opinions are. Flames will be used to fight the very poorly named Risen.


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